How many times has the Marine Corps (in recent years) burned the Navy on shipbuilding? Well the Navy is now pushing back.

 via USNI News

“The funding profile in the President’s budget submission essentially cancels the LPD program following the procurement of LPD-32 in FY23, a program originally planned to procure through LPD-42,” Lt. Gen. Karsten Heckl, the deputy commandant for combat development and integration, told USNI News last week.

After years of working together on naval integration, the line item is the latest example of a growing split between the Navy and Marine Corps, showing how the services have come to an impasse over the future of the amphibious fleet.

Following the rollout of the Navy’s FY 2023 budget, the state of the amphibious force structure is murky. The service’s budget proposal truncates the San Antonio-class LPD-17 Flight II production line and delays the Marine Corps’ new Light Amphibious Warship purchase.

The proposal – already receiving criticism in Congress – is exposing fissures between the two sea services over their visions for amphibious platforms.

There’s a growing divergence between the Navy and Marine Corps, specifically about the LAW, a smaller amphibious ship that’s key to the Marines’ Force Design 2030 initiative and Expeditionary Advanced Base Operations concept, multiple naval observers told USNI News last week.

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 While buying smaller amphibious ships has become a priority for the Marine Corps in recent years, the service maintains it still also needs larger amphibious ships to complete its missions and meet combatant commanders’ needs.

Hugely difficult to justify large amphibious ships when Berger has stated (as have his lackeys) that amphibious assault is off the table and that the EABO is going world wide.  If all that is true then you don't need larger amphibious ships!  Complementary my ass!

 Meanwhile, the Navy doesn’t plan to buy the next LHA – LHA-10 – until FY 2031, meaning there would be an eight- or 11-year gap between LHA-9 and LHA-10, depending on the procurement year assigned to LHA-9, Heckl told USNI News. Delaying the ship’s purchase until then would make “maintaining the line completely untenable for industry, particularly the supply base that construct[s] amphibious warfare ship components,” the deputy commandant said.

That line is ending.  No way they keep it "warm" till 2031!  But Berger's own concept has killed big amphibs!  Unintended consequences and EXTREMELY poor messaging.  He spouts "complementary" but never explains how.  Additionally he is having the Marine Corps fight the sea fight.  I'm sure someone in the  Navy is saying why is a service that is on land become priority for shipping when we can get more frigates and other real deal battleforce ships?

While the Marine Corps has said the landing ships are key to moving its new MLRs around the Pacific, the Navy has kept delaying the start of the program.

The first LAW purchase was originally slated for FY 2022 under the Trump administration’s December 2020 shipbuilding plan, but delayed to FY 2023 in the Biden administration’s FY 2022 budget. Now the first purchase is scheduled for FY 2025. The current plan is to buy one the first year, another in FY 2026 and two in FY 2027.

“The first LAW will not deliver within this FYDP,” Heckl told USNI News in a statement. Heckl was referring to the Future Years Defense Program, or the Pentagon’s five-year budget outlook.

Pushing the delivery of the first LAW past FY 2027 means the Marine Corps would receive the ship after the so-called “Davidson window,” which refers to former U.S. Indo-Pacific Commander Adm. Phil Davidson’s testimony to Congress last March that China could try to take Taiwan in the next six years.

The Marines see LAW as an affordable, smaller ship the Navy could purchase quickly for about $150 million per hull. But keeping LAW affordable has become difficult as the Navy evaluates the survivability of a ship that could end up operating in the South China Sea.

“I think they’re not on the same page. I think the Navy essentially wants to truncate the LPD-17 Flight II and use that money to instead by the Light Amphibious Warship, with the idea that the Light Amphibious Warship is going to have to be fairly survivable to be viable inside these contested environments, which means it will be relatively expensive,” Clark told USNI News. “And therefore they need the money from the LPDs to pay for them because if you have a Light Amphibious Warship that costs $300 million – which is something that’s more in the scope of what the Navy’s thinking – then if you want to buy three or four per year, that’s essentially an LPD-17.”

Story here.